Chuck D Thinks It’s A “Disgrace” That Hip-Hop Has More Solo Rappers Than Groups

Chuck recently joined forces with B-Real of Cypress Hill and Rage Against the Machine (sans Zach de la Rocha) to form the supergroup Prophets Of Rage. He went on to insist that many solo acts are not as great as they think they are and need the support that groups and bands provide.

The group was the only thing that made hip-hop even competitive to the rock world in the first place. But the minute that you started taking the DNA of the thing that worked, it’s the guy and the mic — the guy is Kanye and just Kanye and nothing else — it started shooting down hip-hop as being a legitimate genre and being more of a spectacle. I think it was a disgrace that individual came into the talk of the genre. So the whole thing of “Me, me, I, I” has really brought it down to the point where people feel they have no power ’cause they’re not connected. Hard to bring it up as an individual — that’s why collectives work. So even in the music business where they want to just streamline it to this person we know the individuals of music that are incredible — like Stevie Wonder, Elton John — but so few are at that level where you can’t take your eyes or ears off them. Ninety-five percent of everybody else, you gotta work with somebody to make me interested in you as a fan. I come from a time where cats had to get together and play together to just impress you past fucking 15 or 20 minutes unless they was a super person. So, in hip-hop — I love the genre, I’ll support the genre — I’m dismayed by the individual efforts. I don’t think anybody is that great enough to hold anybody’s attention past half an hour just talking about their damn self. I don’t.

What do you think about what Chuck had to say? Does Hip-Hop need more groups?